Description:

Topics in Economic Growth and Development

Overview

This course will focus on the economic literature that seeks to understand disparities in economic development across countries. Historical events and certain natural and/or geographic factors have contributed to the economic disparities we observe between regions to this day. In this course, students will focus on various channels that have been considered to be responsible for generating long-lasting effects on welfare such as geography, institutions, culture, human capital and technology. In doing so, the course will also touch upon conventional and pioneering empirical methods and causal identification strategies such as Differences-in-differences, 2SLS, OLS, GMM and Instrumental variables. The purpose of this course is to debate about the most influential and innovative developments in this literature.

Outline

The course is divided into parts that focus on specific determinants papers focus on.

1. The role of geography for economic growth

2. The role of institutions and culture

3. The role of trade

4. The role of inequality

5. The role of human capital

Evaluation

The final grade will depend on:

-Class presentation and/or Research proposal (to be decided).

Learning Objectives

Students should get an overview of economic and financial theory.

Students must be able to recognize theories and present arguments with precise examples. Students will have the ability to understand how markets work and explain their weaknesses.

Students will acquire the technical tools that will allow them to perform the advanced empirics required to do economic analysis.

Literature:

Materials

Lecture slides for the selected papers presented by the professor will be made available on the course shared folder.

Reading List

Presented below is the reading list. There are no “required” texts for this class. A selection of papers included in the list below will be covered by the professor in class. The remaining body of work is included to make the reading list more comprehensive and complete. Depending on the evaluation criteria, students will be asked to present one of the papers included in the reading list. The final reading list will be updated before the classes start.

A. GEOGRAPHY AND GROWTH

The origin of differences in economic development across regions

Diamond, Jared, “Guns, Germs and Steel: A short history of everybody for the last 13,000 years”, (1998), Vintage.

Mayshar, Moav, Neeman and Pascali (2015). Cereals, Appropriability and Hierarchy.

Ashraf and Galor (2013), “The Out of Africa Hypothesis, Human Genetic Diversity, and Comparative Economic Development, American Economic Review 103.

Melissa Dell, Ben Jones and Ben Olken (2009), “Temperature and Income”. American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings

Ozak and Galor (2017) “The agricultural origins of time preference”, American Economic Review.

Sanchez de la Sierra (2015). On the Origins of States: Stationary Bandits and Taxation in Eastern Congo” Hansen and Prescott (2000). Malthus to Solow. American Economic Review 92.

B. INSTITUTIONS AND CULTURE

Acemoglu, Daron, Simon Johnson and James Robinson (2001). “The Colonial Origins of Comparative Economic Development: An Empirical Investigation”, American Economic Review 91.

Melissa Dell (2010). “The persistent effects of Peru’s mining Mita”, Econometrica 78.

Alesina, Giuliano, Nunn (2013). On the origins of gender roles: women and the plough. Quarterly Journal of Economics 128(1).

Luigi Pascali (2016), “Banks and Development: Jewish Communities in the Italian Renaissance and Current Economic Performance”, The Review of Economics and Statistics.

Nunn (2008). The long-term effects of Africa’s slave trade. Quarterly Journal of Economics 123(

Michalapoulous, Stelios and Elias Pappaioannou (2013), “National Institutions and Sub National Development in Africa”, Quarterly Journal of Economics

C: THE INTERPLAY OF CULTURE AND INSTITUTIONS

Aghion, Algan, Cahuc and Shleifer (2010). Regulation and Distrust. Quarterly Journal of Economics 125(3).

Grief (1993). Contract enforceability and economic institutions in early trade: the Maghribi trade coalition. American Economic Review 83(3).

Becker. Boeckh, Hainz, Woessmann (2015). The empire is dead, long live the empire! Long-run persistence of trust and corruption in the bureaucracy. Economic Journal 126.

Grief (1994). Cultural beliefs and the organization of society: a historical and theoretical reflection on collectivist and individualist societies. Journal of Political Economy 102(5).

D: INSTITUTIONS, TRADE AND DEVELOPMENT

Pascali. The Wind of Change: Maritime Technology, Trade and Economic Development.

Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson (2005). The rise of Europe: Atlantic trade, institutional change, and economic growth. The American Economic Review 95.

Puga and Trefler (2014) International Trade and Institutional Change: Medieval Venice’s Response to Globalization. Quarterly Journal of Economics

Bruhn and Gallego (2012). Good, Bad and Ugly Colonial Activities: Do They Matter for Economic Development? Review of Economics and Statistics 94(2).

Jha (2013). Trade, institutions and ethnic tolerance: evidence from South Asia. American Political Science Review 107.

*Pascali and Becker (2016) Religion, Division of Labor and Conflict: Anti-Semitism in German Regions over 600 years.

E. INEQUALITY

Ghatak and Jiang (2002), “A simple model of inequality, occupational choice and development 69.

*Clarke, G. (1995), “More evidence on income distribution and growth” Journal of Development Economics 47.

*Forbes (2000), “A Reassessment of the Relationship between Inequality and Growth” American Economic Review.

G. HUMAN CAPITAL AND GROWTH

Valencia, F. 2016. The Mission: Economic Persistence, Human Capital Transmission and Culture in South America.

Hornung 2014 Immigration and the diffusion of technology: the Huguenot diaspora in Prussia. American Economic Review

Dittmar 2011 Information Technology and Economic Change: The Impact of the Printing Press. Quarterly Journal of Economics.

Waldinger 2012 Peer Effects in Science - Evidence from the Dismissal of Scientists in Nazi Germany The Review of Economic Studies

Cantoni and Yuchtman 2014 Medieval Universities, Legal Institutions, and the Commercial Revolution Quarterly Journal of Economics